The Geneseo swim teams proved themselves yet again by having the men take second place and the women take third place out of a total 11 teams at the Ithaca Winter Invitational on Friday Dec. 4–Sunday Dec. 6. Not only did both sides of the team place well as a whole, but they also had outstanding individual performances from multiple swimmers.

Freshman distance swimmer Nancy Nasky took second place overall while breaking the Geneseo record for the 1,650 freestyle. Nasky’s performance helped put the team in third place, while also boosting morale with her impressive achievement.

Senior backstroke and individual medley swimmer Kristian Tialios helped bring the Blue Wave into second place by taking three top eight finishes, including fourth place in the 200 individual medley, sixth in the 100 backstroke and seventh in the 200 backstroke.

These types of performances not only enhance the placement of the team in the overall competition, but also help strengthen their confidence and enthusiasm as a team. Head coach Paul Dotterweich expressed his belief that a fair portion of the team’s success can be attributed to the strong team camaraderie.

Due to Blue Wave’s consistent achievement over these past few seasons, Dotterweich keeps the training and work out regiments relatively the same each year. His reasoning behind this method is that it obviously continues to work for them.

“It’s kind of like a pause, rewind, replay. The program is pretty much the same,” he said. “The athletes are doing a good job. But if anything, I would say that we definitely have better chemistry this year than we did last year.”

By keeping the same schedule every year, it is easy for Dotterweich to get a sense of how successful the Blue Wave will be throughout the season. At their current position, Dotterweich explained that the team should do well in the SUNYAC Tournament again and may even have some swimmers qualify for nationals.

The Blue Wave has competed against very talented teams this season and has shown that the team belongs amongst the best. They fell only to Cornell University and La Salle University—two Division I teams. At the same time, however, other Division III teams—such as SUNY New Paltz—are showing that they, too, are just as worthy of taking on more difficult competition. Dotterweich noted that he believes the tough competition will inspire the Blue Wave to push themselves to perform at the highest level.

“It’s good to see that other teams in our conference are swimming fast,” he said. “That makes us better; it challenges our team to be at our best, which is good for us.”

With final exams and winter break coming up, the Blue Wave’s season will be slightly interrupted. The swimmers are guaranteed to be home between Dec. 22–28, but they have a meet on Jan. 3. This time is a personal challenge for all the swimmers and it allows Dotterweich to see who really wants to end their season strong.

“I always call this the ‘you time,’” he said. “I tell them that this is the time that you decide how you want the season to go.”